Guy who once spray-painted historic trolleys at Boylston then fled the state is back in Boston tagging up the T again, cops say

A troublesome tagger who went to Wyoming after promising, scout's honor, he would never write his nom de spray paint on MBTA property ever again, has returned and is once again marking up T property, Transit Police report.

Police say a surveillance camera captured Marc "CIGA" Meadowcroft scribbling his tag on the doorway leading from the Orange Line to the upper busway at Forest Hills around 1 a.m. on Saturday.

Currently there are several Felony arrest warrants in existence for Meadowcroft's arrest for previous Vandalism on the MBTA as well in the City of Boston. Transit Police detectives will be seeking additional criminal complaints for the most recent incident at Forest Hills

Anyone with info can contact detectives at 617-222-1050 or send an anonymous text tip to 873873.

Police add they're also looking for the two guys spotted with Meadowcroft at Forest Hills:

For instance, liberals might be disinclined to throw wayward youths in jail, but somehow there might be some liberals reading this who might see the wisdom of putting this guy in stocks at Boylston Street Station with a sign that says “I don’t respect other people’s property.”

The T does nothing to stop loitering, no smoking and turnstyle hopping but they have a dragnet for a kid scribbling his name? How much overtime will be spent on this manhunt? If and when he is caught does anyone really believe a judge in Massachusetts will send him to prison for scribbling his name?

Another spoiled brat who thinks he's an artist who is in reality financially well supported by his family who fled to Auntie Meadowcraft's house in Wyoming to seek shelter from the bad authorities in Boston.

Locking people up for destroying what amounts to public art would make things better by discouraging people who agreed to stop it from continuing when they agreed to stop. He got off easy and basically thanked the authorities by being a fucking asshole.

If this no class twerp wanted to do public art, he’d find property owners and ask if he could create said art (assuming he learns how to do more than make bubble letters) and do it that way.

What do you think of situations where taggers mark up actual murals, like what happened on Archdale Road in the past year?

Or are you just being a cluless asshole who thinks taggers are some speshul artusts and that being white, male, and rich means innocence and puppies and flowers and all of that?

We live in a country where black people are routinely executed by police for the "crime" of being black. WTF should we give a pass to some real criminal who can't stop damaging things after numerous arrests?

in the minds of over-privileged little skidmarks like this kid, there's nothing to forgive in the first place because they can do whatever they want and the family money buys them out of ever facing consequences for anything they do, from lame-ass tagging to rape and murder.

Question on punishment. Since MA refuses to lock up repeat criminals for any range of crime there is little deterrent. What can be done to change this? I like the idea of assigning a large fine and if they can’t pay they do work. It’s not a good idea to cater to crime. That is not acceptable

It’s clear that what he is doing is wrong. But without hearing from him, it’s hard to know why he’s doing it. Judicial punishment is often tied to intent. Perhaps this is some sort of compulsion he can’t control. Maybe he needs more than jail time in order to get set straight.

The T-Police must make hundreds of arrests for vandalism. After millions were spent on high tech security cameras if must be easy to catch the vandals in the act. I rode the red line today from Quincy Adams downtown and there was graffiti all along the right of way. It would make for an excellent story for a reporter to get the number of arrest for vandalism on MBTA property. The Transit Police could arrest hundreds but my guess is they don't take it serious so probably less than ten arrests for the year.

Photography of graffiti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graffiti an important document that preserves historical annotations of culture of the times particularly controversial/objectionable/forbidden graffiti ! What may seem without meaning, not useful can turn out to be representative of culture of the times.

I wonder whether the shame of a public bare butt spanking would impose sufficient sting to at least deter the kid. The kid is a a child and perhaps needs some negative training so that the kid makes a connection between damaging property and resulting punishment. It would be better if positive reinforcement could train the kid to stop pissing everywhere with his tag but sometimes a swift kick in the pants response is best. Or in this case spanking on the ass in in public.

But if the kid is determined to violate some boundary then he will find something else to do after jail time.

Perhaps part of the problem is that the kid has a psychological need to violate rules. Not that it's an excuse of the conduct. Instead an attempt to understand the motivation. If the kid has to violate boundaries then either the kid needs to change and grow up; or the kid needs to be given boundaries to violate that don't harm anyone else.

Perhaps that means prison time where the kid can violate boundaries until he has exhausted that need.

Another problem however is why do we as a culture produce so many people who wind up in prison? That's another issue but we can not keep filling prisons where we spend millions simple to warehouse people. That money needs to go to infrastructure.

So we need to understand why so many are going into prison and create the change that results in less need for imprisonment.

What is it with this type of crime that consistently brings out the "beat them over the butt in public" crowd? Every. Single Time. These folks will have to seek their jollies elsewhere because even places like Singapore that allow such punishment don't do it in public.

Having said that, this kid is a cretin who clearly thinks he is above the law and he needs to do some serious community service, if not jail time.

Perhaps there is a compromise here. Could we, the informed intelligentsia of UHub, all agree to let him keep doing this if he in turn lets us tattoo crudely drawn genitals on his face? Not even big ones, like, they could be proportional to the acne. But it seems like a fair compromise where we could all be happy.

There are so many people out there who have committed worse crimes and moral transgressions and who will never spend a day in jail. One of them is the current president (sexual assaults, accepting bribes, inciting violence, obstruction of justice, fraud, possibly treason, etc), another was president 15 years ago (torture and other war crimes, starting a war with fraudulent claims that resulted in tens of thousands of U.S. military and foreign deaths, etc). If I had time I could probably compile a list of 40,000 people who need jail more than this douche.
Settle the hell down, lynch mob! It's only graffiti, which defaces the general scenery about as much as those obnoxious, ubiquitous ads and billboards we're all forced to look at every day and which nobody complains about because you know you can't do a thing about it. Also, when exactly does all this joyful rhetoric of punishment "let's break the guy's hands! let's chop him up into a million pieces!", etc become "threatening to commit a crime"?

There are also a lot of people doing hard time for drug possession and nothing much more - jailed for their addictions out of moralistic impulse without actually having damaged anything.

This guy can't seem to stop destroying public property with his compulsive behavior ... and yet drug addiction is known to be a medical issue not amenable to incarceration, where a good stay in jail might help this privileged brat see the light. Nothing else appears to be getting his attention and the costs of his "art" to the public are mounting.

It is also possible to do this legally - you either have to get property owner permission or you buy yourself a nice wall and do whatever you want with it. There is a guy on I-5 in Washington State who set up his own billboard on his own land to spew right wing conspiracy shite for decades. One could do the same with a wall for graffiti - or even a freaking motor home. He could also go to Berlin where graffiti seems to be somewhat sacred.

If you woke up one morning and CIGA was spray painted on the side of your house, or on the side of your car, wouldn’t you want the well known guy who did it to face jail time, especially since you know he’s done this all over town.

I grew up in this neighborhood, I wish there were more quality graffiti around, Jackson sq to stony is beautiful. this kid isnt good or anything but all of you who call for bringing back public square punishments and all the worst punishments for this are genuinely frightening. you are the people who would comfortably live under fascism even if you might think you would resist.

"Since many "middle Americans" already obey the law, pay their taxes, give their sons to the army, are themselves distrustful of political heterodoxy, and applaud when unions are broken and troublesome people are disposed of, they probably could live without too much personal torment in a fascist state"

I urge you to think about that. Is this the world you want? One of brutal enforcement of minor offenses? Other cities including global capitals like berlin get by with graffiti everywhere. You all need to calm the fuck down.